August 20, 2012

Lionel Logue was the speech therapist who helped King George VI of Great Britain with his stammer. Mr. Logue developed his system of treatment without having been formally trained.

Marva Collins taught students in the ghetto. Those students consistently excelled over other children their age, and they exhibited a healthy love of learning and a willingness to work hard. Marva developed her method of teaching without formal training.

Vivien Thomas was a carpenter by trade. He signed on as a laboratory technician for a ground-breaking medical researcher, eventually running the whole lab. He assisted in the discovery of the cure for shock. Together, he and Alfred Blalock developed a surgical repair for Tetralogy of Fallot, one cause for “blue babies,” which leads to early death for otherwise healthy children. Their operation (and the surgical instruments Vivien created which made it possible) saved many lives. It also opened up the field of heart surgery. Vivien never attended college or medical school, but he ended up training surgeons at Johns Hopkins. They were the surgeons who went on to be the best in the country.

The doctors I listen to about the connection between diet and health did attend medical school. But they found their training flawed, inadequate. So they now treat and teach based on scientific research and what works for their patients in the real world rather than on what medical school encouraged them to believe.

What actually works in the real world often differs from what we have been led to believe by our theories and by the “experts.” I’ve found this to be true in my study of biblical prophecy, too.